CHAPTER IV
THE “FLY-UP-THE-CREEK”
Mildred Kent, the doctor’s daughter, and her closest friend, LettieParker, halted the Speedwells at the close of school the next day.Mildred was a very pretty girl and Dan thought she was just about right.As for the sharp-tongued Lettie, she and Billy appeared to be alwaysquarreling—in a good-natured way.
“We want to know what’s in the wind, boys?” demanded Mildred, her prettyface framed by a tall sealskin collar and her hands in a big shawl muff.
“There’s snow in _this_ wind,” replied Billy, chuckling, for a few sharpflakes were being driven past the quartette as they stood upon thecorner.
“Aren’t you smart, Billy Speedwell!” scoffed the red-haired Lettie.“Doesn’t it pain you?”
“You bet it does!” agreed Billy, promptly. “But they tell me that yousuffer a deal yourself, Miss Parker, from the same complaint.”
“Now, children! children!” admonished Mildred. “Can’t you be together atall without scrapping?”
“And what about the wind, Mildred?” asked Dan.
“You boys were all down to the Boat Club last night, I hear. What isdoing?”
“Aw, don’t tell ’em, Dan!” urged Billy, as though he really meant it.“They’ll want to play the part of the _Buttinsky Sisters_—you know theywill!”
“I like that!” gasped Lettie, clenching her little gloved fist. “Oh! Iwish sometimes I was a boy, Billy Speedwell!”
“Gee, Lettie! Isn’t it lucky you’re not?” he gasped. “There’d be noliving in the same town with you. I like you a whole lot better as youare——”
Dan and Mildred laughed, but Lettie was very red in the face still, andnot at all pacified, as she declared:
“I believe I’d die content if I could just trounce you once—as youshould be trounced!”
“Help! help! Ath-thith-tance, pleath!” begged Billy, keeping just out ofthe red-haired girl’s reach. “If you ever undertook to thrash me,Lettie, I know I’d just be scared to death.”
“Come now,” urged Mildred. “You are both delaying the game. And it’scold here on the street corner. I want to know.”
“And what do you want to know, Miss?” demanded Billy.
“Why, I can tell you what we did last evening, if that’s what you wantto know, Mildred,” said Dan, easily. “There’s nothing secret about it.”
“You can’t be going to plan any boat races this time of year?” exclaimedLettie. “The paper says we’re going to have a hard winter and theColasha steamboat line has laid off all its hands and closed up for theseason. They say the river is likely to be impassable until spring.”
“That’s all you know about it,” interposed Billy. “We just _did_ agreeto have boat races on the river last evening. Now, then! what do youthink?”
“I think all the Riverdale boys are crazy,” returned Lettie, promptly.
“What does he mean, Dan?” asked Mildred.
“Poof! Boat racing! Likely story,” grumbled the red-haired girl.
“Now, isn’t that the truth, Dan?” demanded Billy, but careful to circlewell around Miss Parker to put his brother and Mildred between himselfand the county clerk’s daughter.
“As far as it goes,” admitted Dan, chuckling. “But he doesn’t go farenough. We did talk some about having boat races—iceboat races.”
“Oh, ho!” cried Lettie. Her eyes flashed and she began to smile again.“Iceboats, Dannie? Really?”
“But I thought they were so dangerous?” demurred Mildred, rathertimidly. “Didn’t Monroe Stevens and somebody else almost get drownedyesterday morning trying out an iceboat?”
“’Deed they did,” admitted Billy. “But the river wasn’t fit.”
“And you boys got them out of the water, too!” exclaimed Lettie,suddenly. “I heard about it.”
“Somebody had to pull ’em out, so why not we?” returned Dan quickly,with perfect seriousness.
“And you boys are going to build another boat?” asked Mildred.
“A dozen, perhaps,” laughed Billy.
“We’ll build one if nothing happens to prevent—Billy and I,” said Dan.“And if the interest continues, and there are enough boats on the riverto make it worth while, we’ll have a regatta bye and bye.”
“An iceboat regatta! Won’t that be novel?” cried Mildred.
But Lettie was interested in another phase of it. She demanded: “How bigis your boat going to be, Billy?”
“Oh, a good big one,” he said, confidently. “Eh, Dan?”
“We haven’t decided on the dimensions. I want to make a plan of herfirst,” Dan said, seriously.
“Well, now! let me tell you one thing,” said the decisive Lettie. “Youhave got to build it big enough to carry four—hasn’t he, Mildred?”
“Four what?” demanded Billy.
“Four people, of course. You’re not going to be stingy, Billy Speedwell!You know our mothers wouldn’t hear of our sailing an iceboat; but if youboys take us——”
“Ho!” cried Billy. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, Let!”
“There isn’t any place you go, Billy Speedwell, that _I_ can’t!” criedthe red-haired one, who had always been something of a tomboy. “And I’mnot afraid to do anything that _you_ dare to do—so there!”
“Dear me, Lettie don’t get so excited,” advised Mildred. “Do you supposegirls could sail on your iceboat, Dan?”
“Why not? An iceboat is no more dangerous than a sailboat. And I intendto build our boat with a shallow box on the body so that at least twopassengers can lie down in it comfortably.”
“Lie down in it?” queried Lettie, in a puzzled tone.
“Of course,” grunted Billy, “or the boom would knock their silly headsoff when the boat comes about. Don’t you know?”
“To be sure! ‘Low bridge!’ I’ve sailed enough on a catboat to know whento ‘duck,’ I hope,” returned Lettie.
“And we can sail with you, Dan?” Mildred was saying. “Do—do you think itwill be safe?”
“Perfectly,” replied the older Speedwell. “Not, of course, when we race.We’ll carry only ballast, then, and one of us will have to stand on theoutrigger to keep the boat from turning turtle——”
“Oh, that sounds dreadfully exciting!” gasped Lettie, her eyes shining.
“It sounds pretty dangerous,” observed Mildred. “You two boys are speedcrazy, I believe! Burton Poole’s got a new car—have you seen it? He saysit is a fast one.”
“Pooh!” returned Billy. “Burton’s got to get up awfully early in themorning to be in the same class with us.”
“Never mind the autos,” said Mildred, briskly. “We’ve got what we want,Lettie,” and she laughed. “Remember, boys! we’re to have first call onyour iceboat when it is built.”
“Oh, yes! When it is built,” said her chum, laughing. “We’re allcounting our chickens before they’re hatched.”
“You wait till a week from Saturday, Let,” said Billy, with confidence.“By that time we’ll have hatched a pretty good-sized chicken—eh, Dan?”
His brother would not promise; but that very night the boys drew plansfor the ice racer they intended to build. Mr. Speedwell owned a valuablepiece of timber, and the boys always had a few seasoned logs on hand.They selected the sticks they needed, sledded them to the mill, had themsawed right, and then set to work on the big barn floor and worked thesticks down with hand tools.
They even made their own boom, for Mr. Speedwell helped them, and he wasa first-class carpenter. The iron work they had made at the localblacksmith shop. The canvas for the sails came from Philadelphia, from amail order house. Before the middle of the next week the Speedwellscarted the new boat down to old John Bromley’s dock in sections, put ittogether on the ice, and John helped them make the sails and bend them,he knowing just how this should be done.
They had a private trial of the boat one afternoon, towards dark, and
she worked beautifully. Even Bromley, who had not seen many iceboats andwas an old, deep-water sailor was enthusiastic when he saw the craft,with Dan at the helm, skim across the river, tack beautifully, andreturn on the wind.
They then started to give her a couple of coats of bright paint.
“What you goin’ to call her boys?” Bromley asked.
“Ought to be something with feathers—she’s a bird,” laughed Billy.
“And we’re going to ‘hatch’ her about as quick as you promised thegirls,” his brother remarked.
“Barry Spink’s is the _White Albatross_—he’s going to name it after theboat he and Money wrecked.”
“Bird names seem popular,” said Dan. “Fisher Green has sent for a craftalready built. He showed me the catalog. _His_ will be called the_Redbird_.”
“Say!” shouted Billy, grinning. “I got it!”
“Let’s have it, then,” advised his brother.
“What’s the matter with the _Fly-up-the-Creek_? There’s nothing muchquicker on the wing, is there?”
“Bully!” agreed Dan, with an answering smile. “And I bet nobody else onthe river will think of _that_ for a name. She’s christened!_Fly-up-the-Creek_ she is. But I wonder what Milly and Lettie will sayto that name?”
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